Archive for Ohnmacht | First Floor

The Archive for Ohnmacht brings together conversations with activists and engaged artists from a wide range of contexts and places. They address an issue that is familiar to almost everyone, but which in activist contexts, is often taboo: the sense of powerlessness and helplessness in light of facts and circumstances that seemingly cannot be changed.
We ask them: Have you encountered a sense of Ohnmacht in your activist work? Have you experienced moments in which you feel overwhelmed by such feelings? And if so, how do you deal with them – and how did you keep going?
Accompanied by drawings by Ivana Bugarinović, a selection of 12 interviews can be listened to via loudspeakers in the main space. Selections or in some cases the full versions of the interviews can be found in the online archive.

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Interviews with Doro Blancke, Dóra Denerak Galyas, Djif Djimeli, Nina Khyzhna, Seyda Kurt, Daria Kinga Majewski, Sónia Melo, Mirko Messner, Livinus Nwoha, Andreas Peham, Maike Plath, Norbert Prinz, Leon Ranz, Milo Rau, Rúbia Salgado, Ipek Yüksek, Csilla, Eylem, Tariq und Zeyn.

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Interviews and editing: Markus Gönitzer, Robin Klengel and Miriam Schmid
Drawings: Ivana Bugarinović
Mastering: Thomas Grassegger
Technical setup: Leonie Bramberger

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Ohnmacht Monument | Birke Gorm | Ground Floor

The floor of the main exhibition space is cluttered with a myriad of small objects: pull-tabs from tin cans, capsules, grommets, hairpins, aluminum foil, wire, needles. Birke Gorm collects shiny material on a daily basis, from household items to things found on the street. These objects may look attractive, but they no longer have market value. They have been rendered superfluous, flotsam washed up by the tide of capitalist overproduction. A massive magpie hoard of “dead” materials transforms the space into a treasure chamber that could just as well be the product of a childhood fantasy of wealth as of the burden of civilization. Sculptural works extend this landscape of found objects: figures formed from jute sacks that have been hand-sewn together. They appear to bulge with materials flooding the space. The materiality of these protagonists points towards the constructed nature of ideological and economic modes of production.

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The Monument is the result of an invited competition in which five artists (Ines Doujak, Club Fortuna, Birke Gorm, Katalin Kortmann-Járay, Markus Wilfling) were requested to submit proposals for a sculptural investigation of the notion of Ohnmacht.

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Cellar for Leftist Preppers | Forum Keller

Prepping for tough times is a longstanding habit in the far right: fathers arm themselves to the teeth and renovate their family homes into fortresses, while rightwing YouTubers earn a fortune dealing in canned food, and billionaires construct self-sufficient bunkers in New Zealand. That said, at least since the toilet paper crisis of the COVID-19 pandemic, prepping has become a mainstream practice. Visions of coming societal breakdown constantly imply that bunkering up is a necessity in order to protect oneself – and one’s “nearest and dearest” – from the threat of apocalypse (with or without zombies). What does it mean when our fellow human beings represent an existential threat in our eyes? How does this shape a crisis-based society? Will we end up back in the cave sitting around the campfire, holding sticks in the flames?
The group exhibition collects these and other absurdities and exaggerations, as well as alternative images of preparation for crisis. How might an emancipatory prepper cellar formed in solidarity look? Are there visions for the future beyond the defence of the nuclear family? Who do we want to hunker down with in the cellar – and what for, actually?

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With contributions from Anja Korherr, Anna Vasof, Alice Bucknell, breaded Escalope, Christian Jankowski, Edith Payer, Lisa Horvath, Megan Dominescu, Nikola Macura, Pablo Chiereghin, Shimabuku, Taro Meissner and overnight guests of the Hotel Bellevue.
Curated by Victoria Fux, Robin Klengel and Markus Waitschacher